Episode 198 - Kash Fadaie - Leaders On Leadership
Great leaders know that success comes at a cost, but the rewards are worth it. Leaders On Leadership host Dr. Tracey Jones speaks with Kash Fadaie from Fadaie Insurance Services about the sacrifices, resilience, and vision required to lead with purpose. They dive into the challenges of leadership, from overcoming loneliness to staying energized in a demanding role. Kash shares his journey of building a thriving business, embracing authenticity, and creating impact through heart-centered leadership. If you're looking for real-world insights on growth, mindset, and leadership success, this conversation is for you.
---
Watch the episode here
Listen to the podcast here
Kash Fadaie - Leaders On Leadership
I am very excited to introduce to you Kash Fadaie. Kash, welcome.
It is such a pleasure to be with you and your audience. Thank you, Dr. Tracey.
You are welcome. Let me tell you about Kash. He is the Founder of Fadaie Insurance, an $11 million revenue agency he built from the ground up. He was born in Iran and settled in the United States at the age of eleven. His unique approach integrates spiritual practices with business acumen, shaped by his practice of transcendental meditation and education at Maharishi University of Management.
Kash’s vision extends beyond his success. He aims to revolutionize the insurance industry by franchising Fadaie Insurance to 1,000 locations in five years while inspiring others to find purpose in their professional lives. Kash, I’m so excited to hear your insights on leadership. We talked a little bit about your vision. That’s the last thing we are going to hit on, but let’s get right to it. Shall we?
My father gave a speech many years ago called The Price of Leadership. You’ve read it. A lot in our audience have. It forms the groundwork for this show, where we talk about how, in leadership, there's a price you have to pay. Some sacrifices have to be made because there are things you have to deal with. The first thing he talked about in The Price of Leadership is that you have to be prepared for loneliness. We’ve all heard the term, “It’s lonely at the top.” Can you share with our audience what loneliness has looked like for you as a leader? Maybe a time you went through it and maybe a resource that got you through it.
The Price Of Leadership
Interestingly enough, my last name means sacrifice. “Fadaie” means sacrifice, so it’s pretty poignant. I was used to loneliness as a kid because I was a refugee. I left my homeland at five years old and went to Germany first. New culture and a new language, and I felt like an outsider. As soon as I got used to Germany around eleven, we moved to Florida, United States. Again, I had to acclimate and felt loneliness.
What happened was that right around age 8 or 9, when I was still in Germany before we came to the United States, I became interested in God. I was introduced to the Bible. As a kid, I was inspired as to why certain individuals in the Bible have these these superpowers or these connections. I began asking questions. That led me to read a lot.
When I was 11 or 12, I began reading. I realized that my ancestors were Persian and Iranian, as you said. They had a high place in the Bible, like Cyrus the Great, Darius, and even my name Khashayar in Persian, Xerxes was a person who was in the seven books of the Old Testament. I started to connect with God. From loneliness, that connection or that desire to have that same special place with God brought me from loneliness to aloneness.
You might say, “What’s the difference?” Those words are related. In 1998, after much reading, I decided that I wanted to go within. Jesus, Yeshua was saying, “The kingdom of heaven is within.” In 1998, I made the most important decision of my life, which was to learn meditation. I realized aloneness is all oneness. From that point in my life, when I made that connection to the all-oneness through meditation and esoteric practice, I had conviction. That's how I got into this whole path that I’m on right now.
With God, you are never lonely and you are never technically alone either. People say, “I’m alone.” I’m like, “You are not reading the right books because we have the wisdom of the ages,” as you said. You read about your lineage in the Old Testament. When you dial in your convictions, sometimes that’s the only thing. I forget if it was Lincoln, it was a quote or whatever, where he said, “In the end, if everybody turns against me, I have my convictions.” I love that you said that. All of our leaders here are seasoned leaders. They know there is a big difference between aloneness or all-oneness and loneliness, which sometimes seasons happen.
It’s interesting how things were as a child. I remember as a kid, I was like, “Dad, don’t make us move.” We never moved, but it would have made us more resilient, getting introduced to others. I want to thank you for your comments on that. The next thing he talked about was weariness. You came here, you are building a business, and you are a father. A lot of times, everything falls on the leader. We are pouring into so many, but we have to have people pour into us, otherwise, we will burn ourselves out. You talked about meditation, which is a huge source of replenishment. How do you combat weariness? What’s your regimen for staying in top Kash form?
Combating Weariness As A Leader
By virtue of the nourishing of that connection that then ensued after I learned this practice, that connection grew. It helped me become my authentic self. I wasn't by myself anymore. I had a connection with the CEO of the universe. It then taught me that I am enough. I am worthy, I am special. I am set apart. I am connected. I am anointed. Now, it gave me permission to function from the heart.
I brought heart-centeredness into my business. That heart-centeredness and that genuine authenticity helped me do something very profound, which is building systems. Building a team culture, which is congruent to what I had been shown, and delegating so that it wasn't me doing everything. This is where a lot of business owners we know get stuck. I had permission to relinquish. I had permission to do the right training, set the right systems, and then let go and empower. Now, I can do better things and work on the business. This was something that I organically grasped by the virtue of that connection and that consultation with the divine. That's how it worked out for me.
I love that you talked about authenticity because authentic leadership is your most genuine sense. A lot of times when we are tired or weary, it's because we are not being true to ourselves. We are fighting our souls and something is out of whack. We get exhausted because we are pretending or we are misrepresenting or we have got somebody on the team that we know there's not that congruence there. We are equally yoked. Being in a relationship with somebody or anybody that you know they don't love it.
I love that you talked about authentic leadership because whatever we decide to create as entrepreneurs, it has to be ours. One of my favorite books is The E-Myth, working on the business, not in the business. That gets us tired too when we are doing all the nitty-gritty, but we'll talk about that under vision and we'll also talk about that with abandonment.
We hear the fear of abandonment. If you are an animal lover like I am, abandonment tends to have a negative connotation. When my father talked about abandonment, he said that abandonment means we stop doing what we like and want to do in favor of what we ought and need to do. It's this hyper-focus on pruning off the good for the supreme. With everything you have on there, your brain loves new things and new ideas. You get energized by the creative spirit within you. How do you stay on point and finely tuned to what makes Fadaie Insurance distinctly you?
The Purification Process Of Abandonment
What ended up happening more is the velocity of this momentum of the connection continued to grow. With that came what I call the purification process. Whereas before there were many voices in terms of my consciousness, and there was less discrimination on which is the correct path. Now, as momentum was building up in my connectivity with the divine and self-love, I also had evidence that these decisions that I was making were bearing fruit. The discernment that came with that became more and more succinct and visceral. I learned that the various fears that I had in my life were false evidence appearing to be real. There were distortions. At this point, I'm also working on my diet. I'm also working on my sphere of influence. Who am I hanging out with? Who you associate with is who you become.
Leading With Purpose: Who you associate with is who you become.
With various changes that I made in my life, I learned that the road to success in my life is to go through various pains and fears. I don't give thanks to all things, but I give thanks through all things. I learned to get my internal dialogue or the rhetoric in my mind to be clear and positive. I learned that the giants in my field are the pathway to my next echelon. I played a game with that. I said, “What's next?” My perspective changed and my foes were not foes anymore. They were part of my graduation. I learned to trust God and the divine and said, “These various setbacks or challenges, there's a seed of success for me. That is what I have been looking for.
I have been asking for this, Lord, and you are bringing it. I don't need to run from this. I am ready to go through it with humility, patience, and my connection with you. I played this game. Ever since, I looked forward to what's next because I know it's going to build up my character, refine me more, and serve more. I'm here to serve with my authentic self. It simplified for me. That's how I gained that gradual increase and ascension in my life.
I have never heard anybody call abandonment the purification process. You used the word discriminating, which has negative connotations. We better be discriminating. I heard one of my friends say to me, "I don't want to judge," and I said, "You better judge. I judge my hairdresser, and authors, I judge Amazon products.” Discriminating taste is discernment. We have this thing where you can't sit there, but only you know what this purpose is for you, and you better be very clear on honing that. It's also important for our audience. You will see the evidence, but this is always tough.
As somebody who's been doing this for many years, there were times when I would sit there and say, "It's been three years," or the tipping point. "No, it's 5 years. It's 10,000 hours. That's five years," and then it was another year and I'm like, "Good lord.” I’d love to get your input on this, but I love the confirmation. I love the end evidence. That's God saying, "Yeah," because He's not a God of confusion. He’s not trying to pull the rug and say, "Guest again." I look back now and say that the times when I did not see the evidence, perhaps it's because I needed to get clear on my vision. I didn't have my vision quite dialed in the way it needed to be. I was bleeding out, leaking oil and air, and all that stuff on the way because I wasn't finely tuned.
The Importance Of A Clear Vision
That's a great segue for this talk about vision because that's exactly what it is. Sometimes the evidence is not there right away. We know that. The evidence doesn't come right away. Sometimes in retrospect, we see where we have gone through purification processes. We have made hard decisions, but the key component to where I continued to grow and succeed was that I was able to get this zoomed-out vision of, "What am I here to do?” I know what I am here to do. You showed me. I am clear, and that clarity began to crystallize in my consciousness. It became more detailed. It’s like when you take a lens and you adjust it a little bit and you are able to see more clearly that which has been placed within you.
That came into a very powerful place in my life, which put the wind in my sail and caused me to become more and more clear on my why. With that, I was able to become more light. That heaviness fell away, and that lightness caused more enlightenment in my life. It gave me more conviction and more evidence of why I am doing what I'm doing, and how to do it. That confidence is what drives me every day because I'm very clear on who I am, where I'm going, and why I'm here on earth. That makes me bulletproof, and that also is contagious.
Being clear about who you are, where you’re going, and why you’re here on Earth makes you bulletproof.
Whatever, now that I'm vibrating based on this place that I am, this vibrational frequency that I now hold as truth is what I magnetically draw to myself. Now I see synchronistically a-ha moments everywhere. I am in constant communication with the divine. I am not alone anymore. I am one. I am always at a place where if I have something heavy, I can consult. One of the trick practices that I do is I go for a walk if something is happening or I need clarity. I will talk about it with myself and with the higher self.
By doing that, by isolating and clearing things up, putting it out, the answers come and comfort comes. That's that superpower that I was looking for when I was reading the various literature. Here I am now. I have that connection. I have that superpower. My vision is poignant and clear in this area. I'm very blessed for that.
Sometimes if the vision is a little leaky or a little fuzzy, revert to abandonment and tune that focus, dial that in. How did you come up with the insurance? What drew you to that? That's the first part, and then talk about where you got the vision for 1,000 locations in five years because that's pretty audacious. I love it. Tell me about it.
When I first started in the insurance business in 2006, I had very little capital. I do not have a lot of experience in the insurance industry. I had life experience. I had several businesses, but by faith, I came to it and I fell in love with the business. The reason is that everybody has to have insurance. It's recession-proof. It rides the wave of the cost to repair and replace. Nobody can part with it, and it has true residual income. If I do a good job for somebody on their insurance, they want to stay with me.
Leading With Purpose: Everyone needs insurance—it's recession-proof. It adjusts with the cost of repairs and replacements, is indispensable, and generates true residual income.
I fell in love with the business. I did very well. I scaled it up to where it is now. I learned that insurance is noble work because people trust me. They are affording me a very powerful vibration, which is, “Kash, I want you to protect my cash.” Pun intended. My job is to protect cashflow and protect from risk. I learned that this is so rewarding and so beautiful.
I coined this. I said, “Overtly, I sell insurance, but covertly, I sell assurance.” I'm assuring an individual that I am their liaison. It's confusing, but I am able to navigate them so that they have peace of mind. I married my spiritual life with all the things that we discussed with the corporate world. I endeavor to bring heart-centeredness into the insurance corporate space in the United States of America. Because I love what I do and I do what I love, my wife and I do it together. We’re husband and wife, and we have successfully run this agency. She does the books and I do the operations.
We successfully ran this for many years. I said, “I need to proliferate this proof of concept agency that we have now. It's profitable and it's working. It's an awesome field to be in. We need to promulgate this and give other folks a chance at the American dream.” The best way to do that is to franchise it because if somebody wants to come in at whatever age, and they don't want to spend twenty years like I did, they can say, “I want to come in, plug in. You already figured it all out. I want you to teach me business.” It's a trade that a master has to teach to a student, like martial arts.
“Teach me the trade and plug me in, and I want a return on my investment.” I said, “Okay. Let's launch the franchise.” We are in the middle of launching it very soon. That's where the vision opened up. I thought, “Okay. Let's get this to a thousand people and let's revolutionize the industry and change it and bring consciousness into it.” How do we do that? I thought, what if we gave people one-day discounts under insurance if they meditated? What if we taught them how to eat a certain way? Studies show that if you take care of your temple, you have more insurable interest, and you are going to be at a safer risk. You deserve a discount. I said, “Why don’t we do that?” That's how it all came about. That's where I’m at.
Revolutionizing The Insurance Industry
You are rolling out the franchise now. I will have at the end where people can get a hold of you, but do you have the back systems set up to roll it out?
It's a golden opportunity. If anybody wants to join and get the same privileges as a franchise, but come in as a traditional agent, which is a 1099 agent, they can come in right now. We’ll give you my information, but soon we will no longer accept the traditional agent, but now we will be franchising it and selling it. That’s when the mass scaling happens.
This is like the grassroots level where I have a lot of people that are onboarding because they are like, “Let me come in right now because you get the same privileges as you would otherwise.” We are firing on all cylinders and we are procuring folks who want to learn the business and come in. In closing, they can participate in a new investment asset class because everybody invests in various things. Fiat money, treasuries, stock market, mutual funds, Bitcoin, gold, whatever. Did you know that you can also be an insurance investor? That’s something to think about. Get a hold of me, and I will talk to you one-on-one about that.
I love that you used the word proliferate because as leaders, that’s what we are supposed to reproduce. We are supposed to be making, and that’s what the free market economy is all about. It’s enabling other people to build their wealth, and then they help other people build their wealth and it goes on and on. We have been talking about the price of leadership. Anything else that we haven’t hit on that you would like to share with our audience?
A Rewarding Journey
The price that we pay in life to lead is one of the most rewarding things in our lives. I will attest to that. I want everybody to know that you have it in you. If you want something and you put the attention and the intention out there, you will have every answer you need along the way. This journey is the most beautiful journey that anybody can make to activate our creativity. To participate in people's dreams is the most rewarding thing. You too can be a conduit for that, a conduit for change
If you want something and set both attention and intention toward it, you will have every answer you need along the way.
There’s no better time than right now. I believe where we are right now on the world stage with the things that are happening, the shifts that are happening in life, there’s no better time than now to embark. Most of my growth in my journey, when I look back in hindsight, came from times when it was perceived that there was calamity or tribulation. It's the most beautiful time to start a business or to get behind something creative. I want to leave everybody there with that encouragement and edification. More on that when we talk.
What a great encouragement. As leaders, in the end, we are developers. We are developers of people, of wealth, of peace of mind. I know that’s where your heart is. I want to thank you so much for sharing your thoughts on loneliness, weariness, abandonment, and vision. Kash, what’s the best way for people to get in touch with you? Is there a preferred method?
It’s super easy because my name is so unusual. It sounds like Hawaii, but if you go to Google and type in Fadaie Insurance., I will be there. My website's there. There’s a chat system there. You can use that. You can email me at Kash@FadaieInsurance.com. I'm here to serve. That's my most fun thing to do. Please get a hold of me, and I would love to talk with you.
Thank you, Kash. It's been an honor. For our audience out there, I want to thank you guys so much for tuning in. We couldn’t do it without you. If you like this episode, please hit the subscribe button, and we would love the honor of a five-star review. That goes a long way in helping other people find us and share. If something Kash said stood out to you or you know somebody who could use these words of information or inspiration, please feel free to share it. Never forget that you’ll be the same person five years from now that you are today, except for two things, the people you meet and the books you read. I hope you make them both tremendous. Have a tremendous rest of the day.
Important Links
About Kash Fadaie
Kash Fadaie is the Founder of Fadaie Insurance, an $11 million revenue agency he built from the ground up. He was born in Iran and settled in the United States at age 11. His unique approach integrates spiritual practices with business acumen, shaped by his practice of Transcendental Meditation and education at Maharishi University of Management. Kash's vision extends beyond his current success; he aims to revolutionize the insurance industry by franchising Fadaie Insurance to 1,000 locations in five years while inspiring others to find purpose in their professional lives.